War for Orion: Ghosts from the Past (5 page)

Donnchadh still didn't like to risking a spy
lying low, waiting specifically for ships like his to land. Just
because the Council on Hera turned a blind eye towards illegal
activities, didn't mean that the Queen and her GSOU wouldn't be
waiting to capture them. The GSOU had caught several careless
criminals by staking out at the spaceport as common thugs and
following the criminals back to where they stayed, only to
eventually take them out. Donnchadh wouldn't be one of those
careless criminals, he had trained too long to make careless
mistakes like that.

Donnchadh sped through Erebos' atmosphere and
saw that nothing had drastically changed since the last time he had
left the dead and lifeless planet. The planet still looked void of
any type of sustainable life, even though he knew there was life
thriving all over the planet.

Erebos was a dull planet to anyone who had
lived on any other planet in Orion. The land was drab grey sand and
dirt, without any visible plant life to be seen. The land was rough
and rocky with black cliffs and mountains scattered throughout the
moon, making living off of it that much more difficult for those
who tried. There was little water on the surface of the planet,
just lakes and rivers of lava which would kill anyone submerged in
a matter of seconds

This wasn't a planet that any race would
willingly live on by choice; it was a planet reserved for the
outcast races of the Orion. The races that humans and similar races
feared and didn't want to see living alongside them. Those not
lucky enough to live hidden from society in the slum on other
planets, lived on Plouton or one of its moons.

Small settlements and cities were set up
throughout Erebos by clans or races. Some of the settlements would
allow only certain races to live within the limits, while others
were made up of only family members. The main cities were where
most of the races lived because they were unwilling to fight for
their lives on the unforgiving land like the small clans.

All of the settlements and cities had learned
long ago how to utilize the few resources available on the moon,
but the cities provided the best chance of survival. Very early on
in colonization of the planet, it was discovered that the lava
could be used to provide electricity to homes in cities. Other
significant discoveries had been made, such as the water wells
hidden below the surface of the planet that the races used to for
daily activities.

These conditions made Erebos the perfect
place for the Deimos Brotherhood's base, which was hidden between
the two biggest mountains on Erebos, far from any permanent city or
settlement. The two mountains were parallel to one another and were
surrounded by a lake of lava. Very few knew that there was any life
hidden in the mountains, and if one happened to see a ship
disappear into the mountains, there was no known way to cross the
lake of lava safely to investigate any further.

Donnchadh reduced the thrusters and lowered
Cerberus
down as he flew in-between the two mountains.

He pulled out his comline. "You can extract
the dock for landing.
Cerberus
and its crew are back from
their mission."

A reply quickly came from the other end of
the comlink. "Extracting the dock now."

A hole opened up in the mountain and a dock
slowly to extruded from it. Donnchadh wasted no time, gently
putting the ship down on the dock. When he landed, the dock
retracted back into the mountain taking
Cerberus
into the
dark black hole. When it had fully retracted back into the hangar,
there was a loud ring to alert those on deck that a ship had
entered.

Donnchadh and Sanguinarius got up from their
seats immediately upon hearing the ring and headed towards the
ramp. Ulisse was already patiently waiting to open the ship's rear
ramp when Donnchadh reached him. He gave a nod of the head and
Ulisse lowered the ramp for the three of them to exit.

Donnchadh led his two men through the quiet
hangar, ignoring the looks from the workers, into the elevator.
Once his men had gotten on, he pressed a button that would take
them down three stories and he turned around to face the direction
the door would open once they had descended three floors. Without a
sound, the elevator stopped and the doors slid open, letting
Donnchadh off and into the main headquarters.

It didn't take long after getting off of the
elevator to get a few smiles from some of the other members who had
obviously heard of the success of their last mission. They headed
towards a room that said
Mission Debrief
on the door. This
was the room where everyone who was interested in the mission would
meet up to hear about how everything had unfolded. It was a way for
those assigned to the mission to brag, but it also encouraged
others to out-do them on their next mission and possibly learn
different ways to deal with certain situations.

Donnchadh entered the room first, not
surprised to see that every single one of the seats was taken,
leaving many standing in corners throughout the room.

This mission was different from the
Brotherhood's normal ones and almost every member had volunteered
themselves for it. All of the members knew what had happened to
Donnchadh and what Armino had done to some of the very best not
long ago.

Donnchadh stood at the front of the room and
smiled. "So I'm guessing you all want to know everything that
happened on our little trip Gaea," There was a roar of approving
voices and Donnchadh looked at his two partners. "Let me start off
by saying that the Deimos Brotherhood has gotten their long awaited
revenge on Armino Valens. He suffered a great deal before his death
and I personally made sure that he will never harm one of our own
again!"

Donnchadh started to tell all of the members
of everything that he, Sanguinarius, and Ulisse had done in great
detail, making sure not to leave out a thing. Everyone in the room
was grinning with evil pleasure at how much Armino had suffered
before his eventual death, though some looked angry that they
couldn't have taken part in it.

Once he had finished, they exited the room,
pleased that they would no longer have to worry about the Queen's
best man interfering with their work. Armino had foiled a lot of
missions in his time as the Queen's right hand man and had made
many of the Brotherhood look like complete fools. With Armino gone,
there wouldn't be any true leadership in the GSOU for some time.
They would be discombobulated and the Brotherhood would gain an
upper hand for the first time in a long time. Someone would
eventually take over his spot, but they'd be no Armino, leaving the
GSOU as a far less elite squadron as they had once been. The Queen
had lost her best man to a random murder, with no links to the
Deimos Brotherhood, and that opened the doors to many new
opportunities.

Anlon woke up at exactly 7:00 a.m. and went
downstairs to down a quick breakfast before he started his day. He
went to the cupboard, pulled the door open, and picked out some
granola bars to scarf down. He sat down at the table to think about
how exactly he was going to confront Moran today. Randomly knocking
on the door and asking who killed his family probably wasn't the
best approach to take. He still didn't know who this guy personally
and didn't know if he'd tell the police that he was actively
searching for the killers on his own, which would alert the
officers that he had lied to them at the station.

He got up from the table and grabbed the
key's to his mom's truck from off of the key rack. Anlon went
outside, opened the door to the black pickup, and jumped in the
driver seat as he put the address in his mapping system. He wasn't
sure if the officers had gone yet, but doubted it because they had
many other things to worry about on this case.

Anlon knew he was headed for one of the
bigger cities in the District of Hassental, but wasn't exactly sure
how to get there because he had never traveled to the city before.
He followed the directions out of the country and into the big
city. Upon entering the city limits, he could tell that this
definitely wasn't one of the big extravagant cities that he had
heard about from his father. He hit pot hole after pot hole and
many of the buildings he passed looked vacant. Humans and other
races roamed streets, seemingly unaware that none of the buildings
were vacant, and continued on with their lives as the if the
buildings were thriving with business. He glanced down a couple of
alleys as he passed and saw races huddled up, sleeping by fires to
keep warm.

His mapping system went off as he pulled in
front of an old apartment building that stood a hundred stories
tall, but looked abandoned from the outside like all of the other
buildings. There were broken windows with boards covering only a
few of them, graffiti on the walls, and parts of the building that
looked like they were about to completely collapse. Anlon double
checked the address that he had typed in the mapping system before
slowly getting out of the truck.

Anlon slowly meandered towards the apartment
building, still unsure whether he should waste his time going
inside or not. He saw that the upkeep inside wasn't any better than
the outside of the building once he entered as the tile floor was
broken and cracked. The glass from the broken windows littered the
floors inside and three chandeliers lay broken and scattered across
the floor. The paint on the walls looked to have once been white
like the floors, but were now covered in so much dirt and grime
that they were almost black.

Anlon stopped in the middle of the room and
looked around to see if there was a reception desk somewhere with
directions, but saw none. The only thing that he saw were five
elevators, and by looking at the rest of the building, he highly
doubted that they were operational.

Anlon let out a deep sigh. "I'm never going
to find Moran."

All of a sudden he heard the crunching of
glass and quickly turned around to see where it had come from. "May
I help you find a room?"

Anlon was surprised to see an older model
robot standing where he had been only moments ago. The robot looked
just as old as the building and he guessed that it had probably
been here when it had been originally built. He had no idea where
the robot had come from, but there was no way that he was going to
decline the offer.

"Yes. I'm looking for Moran Borislav. Do you
know if he lives here?"

The robot stood quietly and Anlon wondered if
it was ever going to respond. After several silent seconds he
decided it was broken and turned around to try one of the
elevators.

"Fifty-second floor. Room number two
forty-seven," The robot responded as Anlon reached the
elevator.

Anlon pressed the call button for the
elevator. "There's some good news! Now I get to find out if I can
use the elevator to go up or if I have to walk up fifty-two flights
of stairs."

To Anlon's surprise, the elevator door opened
and he reluctantly got inside. He slowly reached out and pressed
the fifty-second button not sure what to expect from the elevator.
It jerked hardly up and he waited nervously for the ding to get off
so he could exit the elevator. As soon as the doors open, he got
off and looked down the musty halls.

There were no directions on the walls telling
him which way to go, so he decided he would start with the hall on
the left. He walked the hallways for a couple of minutes, and
noticed that these hallways were as silent as the lobby had been.
The floors didn't look well traveled and he saw no signs of even
the slightest movement. The apartments seemed like they had been
abandoned for years.

"Two forty-five, two forty-six, two
forty-eight?"

Anlon stopped in his tracks confused because
the numbers on the doors had completely skipped number two
forty-seven. He could've sworn that the robot had said room two
forty-seven, and even if it hadn't, it still shouldn't be missing.
He walked back down the hall to see if two forty-seven had come up
a little bit earlier and he had somehow glanced over it by mistake,
only to realize that he hadn't missed it at all.

He decided to knock on two forty-eight to see
if he'd get a response, but he didn't hear a stir from within. He
knocked on the door harder this time, waiting to see if anyone
would answer, but he still got the same response.

As he turned around to leave, he noticed a
small bug flying in front of him and it continued to fly in that
one spot, as if staring at Anlon. He moved his head to get a closer
to look at the bug and it immediately darted away to the ledge of
room two forty-eight, still continuing to watch him. Anlon stared
at it another moment and then turned back around to leave until he
heard a voice come from somewhere in the hall.